You Can't Beat Beethoven

December 31, 1985

TOKYO — Fishmongers do it, accountants do it, even geisha in a Tokyo teahouse district do it: They wind up the year by singing Beethoven's 9th Symphony. What's more, they do it in German. Though no one is quite sure how the custom of closing the old year with Beethoven began, the number of year-end concerts is increasing every December. Records show 19 performances in 1962, 49 in 1977, and 103 in 1982. This December an estimated 200,000 Japanese all over the country will have taken part in about 150 concerts featuring nothing but the 9th. The custom, which appears to have started immediately after World War II, is seen by some as a symbol of the nation's rising from the ashes of defeat. Others see it as an example of a local love of festivals, yet some decry it as the murdering of a great piece of music.